


Day Twenty-Four

by dizzy



Series: Crisscolfer Advent 2014 [24]
Category: Glee RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-25
Updated: 2014-12-25
Packaged: 2018-03-03 09:16:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2845805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dizzy/pseuds/dizzy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><b>Prompt:</b> Darren is a guardian angel in training and is assigned to Chris (and/or Hannah).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Day Twenty-Four

Darren knows he was accepted into the Guardian program not only because he’s kind of a legacy (with his dad and brother both being Guardians) but because he managed to charm the Guardian Board into overlooking what he’d consider his minor flaws; a sometimes wandering mind, a short attention span. He knows - has known since he first arrived here and found out about the program - that he’d be perfect for it. 

And he is. He loves it. He loves helping people, and keeping them safe and cared for. He knows there will come a time when he has to step back, as all Guardians do when their assignments come to a close, but he’s seen the paperwork and he knows he won’t have to worry about that for a very long time. He’s Guarding a sweet little girl, chubby cheeked and blonde, a curious little one that spends most of her day toddling behind her brother and listening to his stories. 

*

“We’ll start you out with a young one,” the assignment coordinator had told him. “Though you should be warned, she’ll need some extra care.” 

“I don’t mind!” Darren had been all wide-eyes and excited eagerness. “How young?” 

The coordinator smiled. “She just turned one.”

“And it’s Long Term?” Darren checks. That’s what he’d marked down on all his forms.

“It is,” the coordinator confirms. “You understand the responsibilities of Long Term Guardianship, right? Do we need to go over that again?” 

“No, I got it,” Darren says.

Some Guardians prefer Short Term assignments. They appear to people in need, people seeking comfort or friendship through trying times, and then once they’re no longer needed they go back into rotation for a new assignment. Short Term Guardians fade into memory as imaginary friends, as that special feeling of calm in the midst of a tumultuous life experience, as that boost of confidence when someone is doubting themselves or the faint feeling of someone whispering encouragement into an ear. 

But some people need Guarding their entire lives, and some Guardians spend seventy, eighty, ninety years with the same person. That’s what Darren wants. 

He looks down at the photo of the blue-eyed little girl and smiles. Her name is Hannah. 

*

Hannah’s a beautiful soul. Darren recognizes that as soon as he ‘meets’ her - appears at the end of her bed and watches her sleep. She’s a beautiful soul who will travel a road far more difficult than she deserves, but he’s honored he gets to be the one to hold her hand and watch over her. 

His heart swells just watching her. 

Not everyone has a Guardian. Not everyone needs one. Some human beings are perfectly capable, or believe they are to the extent that they become unsuitable for candidacy. Guardians appear where they are needed, but also where they are _wanted_. 

Some people find the strength and comfort that Guardians provide all by themselves. They want to only rely on what is within them, and there’s nothing wrong with that. 

Hannah’s brother is that kind of person, but sometimes it hurts Darren because Chris could _use_ a Guardian. 

*

Darren doesn’t remember much of what his life was before being an angel. That’s just kind of the way it works; it’s all fresh and sharp when you first arrive but time dulls it and then fades it until _life_ is nothing but a wisp of nostalgia that catches you off guard once in a while. 

He thinks in life he and Chris would have made good friends, though. Sometimes when Hannah’s asleep or safe in her mother’s arms, Darren will go sit with Chris for a while. He likes watching Chris while he’s reading or writing or playing video games. Chris talks to himself and sometimes it almost feels like he’s talking to Darren instead, which makes Darren’s happy. 

Guardian Angels lead very solitary lives just by necessity, but Darren thinks he must have loved to be around people in his previous life because he (save those moments when he’s whispering comfort and love to Hannah) he never feels more fulfilled than when Chris says something and he can answer back.

*

It’s trying at times, being Hannah’s angel. She’s so full of sunshine and light but suffers so much. 

Darren becomes familiar with the halls of the hospital, and with the way she cries when her mother has to walk away. 

He appears to her sometimes then. They have the ability to be seen by humans but it’s supposed to be used with great care and never very often. Dream times are usually the safest, but Hannah is still so young but needs more than a feeling sometimes. 

So he comes to her in solid form when she’s all alone and he makes her laugh. He tells her stories and strokes her soft hair and holds her hand until she falls asleep. She always tells her mother about her friend, the nice man who sings her songs. 

*

Darren never stays with Hannah when her parents are with her. Later on he might, when she’s old enough to decide for herself what’s real and what isn’t, but he doesn’t want to confuse her. 

That’s usually when he goes and finds Chris. Chris is skeptical enough that he’d never believe Darren was real, not unless Darren did appear to him in human form. 

And Darren couldn’t. To appear to your Assigned in moments of extreme pain or duress is one thing; to appear to someone else simply because he want to is strictly forbidden by the Board, under punishment of assignment termination. 

So when Chris is hurting, all Darren can do is sit beside him and focus all the energy and love he has into Chris. It could never be the same as what he can do for Hannah, but he still tries. 

“Please take care of her,” Chris whispers, his head in his hands. He’s still a boy, barely a teenager, and Darren _hurts_ for him so. 

He wraps his phantom wings around Chris and whispers, “I am, I promise.” 

* 

Darren was warned about the down time when he took the assignment. It’s a drawback of Long Term Guardianship; sometimes you’re just not needed, but you have to stick around in the days, weeks, months, sometimes years between times when you _are_. 

He’s glad to not be needed, though. It means that Hannah’s happy and healthy and that’s really all he ever wants for her. 

There’s someone else in the house that the same can’t be said for, though. Darren begins to wait in Chris’s room for him to come home from school every day. He can’t wipe Chris’s tears and he can’t fix anything for Chris but he can be there. 

And he thinks maybe Chris feels it, too. Sometimes he looks in Darren’s direction and talks. He tells Darren the things he doesn’t tell his parents, like the mean things the kids at school say and he his teachers think he’s dumb but he really knows he isn’t. 

Darren knows Chris isn’t dumb. Chris is very smart, he’s clever in ways Darren isn’t. 

He also knows that Chris is brave and caring and beautiful down to his soul. Darren’s the angel but Chris looks like one, especially in quiet moments when he sleeps. 

*

Chris talks out loud more and more to Darren, to the point that Darren begins to wonder if Chris actually has seen him. 

That he wonders means he should probably back away and refocus himself on Hannah, but Hannah is so happy and Chris is… so, so sad. 

He does what he can. Sometimes he makes suggestions to Hannah, tells her when to go and cheer Chris up or give him a hug. He almost hopes in those moments that Chris can feel the hug is from him. Sometimes he curls his wings around them both and enjoys how it makes them smile, the faintest feather-brush of affection. 

*

Guardians can appear to their Assigned in dreams as easily as thinking it so. He can check in on Hannah, make sure she’s not having nightmares or send special messages to her. He tries to make her dreams as fun as he can, and bring her to wakefulness with a smile on her sweet little face. 

He tries the same with Chris, knowing it won’t work but compelled to anyway. He thinks he gets further than he’s really meant to, because once in a while when he tries very hard and Chris dreams very loudly he can _see_ them. 

He almost wishes he couldn’t. Chris has dreams that plague him, terrible memories revisited and scenarios that he’s afraid will happen coming to life in his mind. All Darren can do is stand outside of a foggy wall and watch. 

Not being able to help is the worst feeling ever to Darren. 

Sometimes even the dreams Chris has that seem nice aren’t really that nice. He watches Chris dream of kissing a boy and holding his hand and then the boy laughing at him and saying horrible things. 

It’s not a memory of his own but it wakes something up inside Darren. He is jarred out of the dream space and back into Chris’s room, sitting shakily on the edge of the bed. 

In his life, he must have liked to kiss boys. If he breathes in and remembers hard he can almost see a face, but then it’s gone in the next instant. 

It pleases Darren to have the knowledge, though. It explains a thing or two about the way he feels when he’s around Chris. He thinks of the dream and how happy Chris was to be kissing a boy and how in the dream he could see it on Chris’s face when he realized it was all a horrible joke. 

“If I were a boy again...” Darren whispers, and then he brings himself into being and leans down to press a soft, quick kiss to Chris’s lips. He’s invisible again just as quickly, already gone from sight when Chris’s eyes fly open in confusion and he touches two fingers to his mouth. 

Darren holds his breath until Chris goes back to sleep. He peeks into the dream space to find it a pleasanter view this time. In it Chris is kissing a boy with black curls and a smile, a boy who looks and feels a little familiar to Darren. 

He tiptoes back out of the dream and smiles. Chris will be okay, just like Hannah will. He’ll make sure of it.

**Author's Note:**

> [reblog on tumblr](http://alittledizzy.tumblr.com/post/106098044195/crisscolfer-fic-a-day-advent-2014-day-twenty-four)


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